Filming
got underway on May 16, 1988
in Almeria, southern Spain.
A dry riverbed was the site
for an elaborate tank chase
that afforded Spielberg ample
opportunity to redisplay his
cinematic prowess. "There
was not much written on the
chase in the script. It was
a lot like what they had in
the old Lawrence
of Arabia script, 'And
then they took Aqaba', without
any description of how. We had
one page written on the sequence,
but I wanted it to be seven
to ten pages long. I wanted
it to be the centerpiece of
the movie. So rather than writing
it, I sat down with my two sketch
artists, David Jonas and Ed
Verreaux and I just sort of
made the whole chase up on paper
from frame 1 to frame 405. That
was a great couple of weeks.
I think I had more fun creating
the chase on paper than I did
shooting it in Spain."

Spielberg and the
script.

Inspired by a
sequence in the original Chris
Columbus script, Spielberg and
his artists designed the tank
chase to equal the impact of
the truck chase in Raiders.
"No action sequence that
I will ever shoot will be as
good as the truck chase in the
first film - so I was not even
trying to best that one. The
truck chase is still my favorite.
But the tank chase was different
because it had more story to
it. There is action inside the
tank and outside the tank -
and there is also humor. And
within the chase itself certain
characters evolve. Henry becomes
strong in that scene for the
first time in the movie. Indy
becomes weak in that scene for
the first time in the movie.
Aside from the story elements,
another difference between this
and the truck chase was that
the truck went really fast,
or at least we made it appear
to be going fast, but we could
not do that with the tank because
it was a lumbering mass of steel
and it could only go about eighteen
miles per hour. As a result,
the pacing had to be different
and shooting the sequence took
a lot of time. It was still
fun, but it was very slow."

The 'lumbering
mass of steel' was a fully functional
replica of a German 1917 International
Mark 7 army tank used in World
War I, designed and built by
George
Gibbs. According to Gibbs
building this tank was the most
difficult task of the film.
These tanks were thirty-six
feet long and weighed twenty-eight
tons and only seven or eight
of them were built for the First
World War. The only one left
in the world is located in the
Tank Museum in Bovington Camp,
England. Since both Spielberg
and Lucas wanted the tank to
look as realistic as possible,
Gibbs built one on the chassis
of an old excavator that also
weighed twenty-eight tons. The
tracks alone weighed seven tons
and were driven by two Range
Rover V-8 engines, which in
turn powered two automatic hydraulic
pumps - one to drive each of
the two tracks. It also had
big bulldozer motors in the
back to power the whole tank
and guns that actually fired
blank charges. Overall, the
tank was quite accurate. The
only real difference between
this tank and an actual World
War I model was that the First
World War tanks had extra eyeball
guns on each side and they did
not have a turret that turned
around.

Tank
production illustration
opposite to the fully functional
replica.

For the construction
of the tank Gibbs chose to use
actual steel and not prefabricated
materials such as aluminum or
fiberglass. His goal was not
only to enhance the tank visually,
but also to help it withstand
the abuse it would take during
the intensive weeks of principal
photography. "World War
I tanks did not have suspension,
so we build ours without suspension
also. Because of that, I knew
the vibration inside that tank
would be absolutely tremendous
and would shake a mockup vehicle
to pieces. For that reason,
I decided to build the tank
from steel. Also, if any of
it ever broke apart we could
quickly weld it back together.
As it turned out, the tank went
down the sides of mountains
and over really hard, rocky
surfaces without any damage
at all-and I knew then that
I had made the right decision."

The
crew preparing to film some
scenes on the tank.

The tank was built
in four months and then flown
to Almeria, in southern Spain,
aboard a British Belfast plane
- one of the largest aircraft
in the world. To transport the
monster tank from location to
location, it was placed on the
back of a low loader truck.
"We were lucky," said
Gibbs. "Shooting went smoothly
and the tank only let us down
twice. The first time was because
the rotor arm in the distributor
broke and it took us a day to
get a new one from Madrid. The
second time, it was so hot that
the solder in the oil coolers
actually melted and flowed around
with the oil into the valves,
shattering two of them to pieces.
So we had to change one of the
engines and that also took one
day. I think everyone expected
to lose a lot more time, but
the tank worked really well."
Driving the tank was effects
technician Brian Lince, who
had to weather the extreme heat
and the torturous terrain. "Brian
did an excellent job. Being
in that tank was like being
in an oven, and he was in there
every day for nearly eight weeks.
We had ten industrial electric
fans inside to try and keep
Brian cool, the engine cool
and the hydraulic oil cool.
Not only was it hot in there,
but since the tank had no suspension,
Brian got rattled around so
much that when he came out and
tried to take a cup of tea,
he would spill it before he
could get it to his lips."

Between
takes on location in Almeria,
Spain.

To accommodate
an elaborate fight scene on
top of the tank, Gibbs duplicated
the upper portion of the lumbering
vehicle and mounted it on an
ex-army searchlight trailer
towed by a four-wheel drive
truck. The eight-ton partial
tank was identical in detail
to its full-size counterpart
except that it was constructed
from lightweight aluminum and
had tracks made out of rubber
so the actors and stuntmen could
fall on them without being injured.
It also featured 'people catchers'
on either end in the event anyone
accidentally fell off. In total
it took two weeks to film the
ten minutes shot at a cost of
$200.000 per day.

Ford, as in the
previous films, did a certain
amount of his own stunts. He
was extremely active and willing
to take greater risks with his
own physical well being than
the production could quite honestly
allow him to do. "I know
in making these movies I'm going
to get dirty, bruised, and bumped
around a lot," Ford admitted.
"Bumps and bruises go wth
the territory. It's what distinguishes
an Indiana Jones movie from
any other adventure film. You
sit there in the theater and
know I'm doing it."

Armstrong and Ford.

Once again Vic
Armstrong doubled for Ford and
served as the film's stunt coordinator.
He staged all the stunts the
most dangerous of which was
a heart stopping fourteen feet
leap from a galloping horse
on to the moving tank. "I
had to travel ten or 11 feet
sideways from a galloping horse,
moving head first and landing
on the back of the tank,"
said Armstrong. Though this
was one stunt Ford didn't even
bother to attempt, he did almost
everything else, including hanging
off a side canon as the vehicle
ploughed through a rocky gorge.
Armstrong did confessed that
his "toughest stunt on
any movie with Harrison Ford
was talking Harrison out of
doing it!" There was a
little scene where Indy leaps
off a sixteen-foot rock knocking
an Arab and his horse down,
punches the guy out, and then
rides off on the horse. Ford
approached Armstrong and proposed
to do the stunt himself. Armstrong
presented several reasons why
the scene should be done by
a stunt double but Ford insisted
on doing the stunt. Seeing there
was nothing that could convince
Ford Armstrong used his secret
weapon. He told Ford that if
he continued to do so many stunts
by himself he would put him
out of commission. Ford realizing
that it wasn't only a matter
of safety retreated and Armstrong
performed the stunt himself.

Unfortunately,
stuntmen couldn't help poor
John Rhys-Davies who at the
time of filming suffered from
acute sciatica. "Literally
about three days before we started,
I felt this slight pain down
my leg. And I spent my entire
damn film taking pain pills
or finding some way to get rid
of this damn sciatica. And riding
a horse through that is not
to be recommended. It's all
right when you're actually up
on these stirrups and you've
in full gallop. It's the intervening.
But the show goes on and we
do it," aid Davies and
continued, "The two that
I've done with Spielberg, he
must think I'm a terrible wimp.
I've been terribly sick on both
of them. On the one in Tunisia,
we all went down with this damned
bug that we had there. My God
it was terrible!"

Indy, Sallah and
Henry in action.

With the tank
scene completed, the production
moved to Majorca, where, on
a long-abandoned airfield, scenes
involving Nazi fighter planes
were completed. Then it was
on to Granada, where the railway
sequences were shot at Gaudix
Station, transformed into a
replica of the Middle Eastern
town of Iskendrun, complete
with complete with camels, goats,
market sellers, beggars, and
women with yashmaks. A mosque
had been built in the backyard
for additional atmosphere rather
than added later as a matte
painting effects shot. The actual
town of Iskenderun was part
of a small sultanate that existed
during the period of the film.
It's a place located somewhere
south of Turkey and north of
Syria.

After three weeks
in Spain, Spielberg moved his
crew to England for an additional
ten weeks on the soundstages
at Elstree,
where various interiors were
completed.

To facilitate
the action onboard a steamship
off the Portuguese coast in
a raging storm, a forty-foot-by-sixty-foot
section of deck was constructed
on large gimbals to produce
the requisite rocking motion.
"We also had wind machines
blowing and a dozen dump tanks
filled with water," said
George Gibbs. "On this
small piece of set, the actors
and stunt people were trying
to act while tons of water fell
on them. It was a pretty shattering
experience. One of our dump
tanks held three hundred gallons
- three thousand pounds of water-and
when we let two of them go at
once, it would knock people
clear across the deck."

"The sequence
on the boat seemed to be the
toughest for everybody,"
George Lucas observed. "It
was the scariest and the hardest
to do. Everyone was thrown back
and forth on the deck. Scenes
like this are actually more
difficult to do than dangerous
stunts, because on the stunts
you take so many precautions
to make certain no one gets
killed. But storm scenes like
those on the boat you cannot
really control. Everyone was
getting battered around."

Preparing a good shot.

"Nobody likes
to be wet," Spielberg elaborated.
"Plus, it was cold. We
shot the sequence in what you
could call wintertime -it was
the coldest summer in London's
history-and we did not have
any water warmers, so the water
was ice cold. Anyone who was
not up before the first shot
was definitely wide-awake afterwards.
When we came to work in the
morning, all of us got into
out raincoats - except Harrison
who couldn't wear anything but
his fighting clothes. I just
think it irritated everyone.
Nobody wanted to be underwater
for three days-and after Jaws,
I hate water anyway."

Spielberg and Lucas.

The interior of
the Grail Temple was filmed
on an elaborate 80 feet into
the air set designed once again
by Elliot Scott. Suddenly the
whole temple begins to shake,
the floor heaves up and splits
and the Grail slips out of Elsa's
hands and into the fissure.
"The temple sequence was
one of the reasons I told George
Lucas that this movie was the
hardest I had ever worked on,"
George Gibbs commented. "The
set was about the same size
as the one in The Temple
of Doom and we only had
about six weeks to build it.
We had five main gimbals to
make the floor split open and
heave up. Then we had more gimbals
to make columns fall down and
open trapdoors - a total of
about ten gimbals in all. Fortunately,
resetting took only about twenty
minutes. Since everything was
hydraulic, we simply put the
set back to the start position
and filled up the cracks with
plaster." One effect the
filmmakers were unable to do
on the full-scale set was the
moment when the Grail falls
out of Elsa's hands, strikes
the temple floor and causes
the stone surface to crack open.
"The shot was attempted
on location," noted visual
effects supervisor Michael McAlister,
"but it was a very difficult
thing to accomplish. We did
it about a thousand times ourselves.
It was one of those shots where
you say, 'Oh, yeah, cracking
floor - that's easy,' and then
it takes two months, off and
on, to get it right. We actually
built a full-size floor section
about twenty feet square, prescored
a crack and sealed it up with
plaster and sand. Then we tossed
an epoxy version of the Grail
in from about six feet away.
That turned out to be the most
difficult part of the shot getting
the Grail to land in precisely
the right spot. Once we did,
we pulled levers hooked to each
side of the floor to literally
separate the two halves of the
set and form the crack."

Continuing the
grand horror tradition from
the previous two films the script
featured a scene of Indy exploring
catacombs beneath the streets
of Venice that contained mummified
bodies, channels filled with
petroleum water and thousands
upon thousands of rats, the
grossest of all vermin. The
production team made an order
of 1000 sewer rats to Animal
Actors in December 1988. The
animal expert who had supplied
the previous two Indiana Jones
films with vast numbers of snakes
and insects suggested that they
should breed their own army
of rodent extras. "Gray
rats are hard to find,"
noted Robert Watts, "but
they breed fast and we had plenty
of lead time. It took us only
about four or five months to
get all the rats we needed."
At the end they came up with
5000 rats. For the safety of
cast and crew each of the rats
had been certified free of disease.
When the time came to film the
scene every inch of the wonderful
set created by Elliot Scott
was covered with them. No stone
was left uncovered. And as had
happened on the proceeding two
movies at least half of the
crew hated rats and had to wait
outside the stage until filming
was completed. "Same thing
happened with the snakes. We
lost half the crew on the first
movie, and we lost three-quarters
of the crew with the bugs,"
recalled Spielberg. Although
in start it was not an easy
alliance soon cast and crew
came to like to their fury co-stars.
"That kind of stuff doesn't
bother me at all," said
Ford, who was seen playing with
a rat during a break. "The
rats didn't bother, the snakes
didn't bother me. It's the people
I'm scared of." Doody,
too, appeared braver than Karen
Allen and Kate Capshaw did opposite
their animal co-stars, "Most
of the creatures, and bugs,
or whatever, that I was involved
with I thought were more frightened
of me than I was of them."

Venice
library and catacombs production
illustrations.

Animal expert
Mike Culling worked with wranglers
and animal trainers to provide
the right horses, lions, rats,
and snakes for filming. "Harrison
Ford is very good with animals
and carefully prepares for working
with them and handling them,"
animal consultant Mike Culling
said.

"I found
the rats easier to work with
than the snakes and the bugs
in the previous films,"
observed Frank Marshall, who
doubled as second unit director
for many of the action scenes.
"Like the bugs, however,
they had a tendency to go where
we didn't want them to. Snakes
move so slowly that it's easy
to plunk them down in a place
and then get a good shot. But
rats and bugs swim fast and
they move fast, and once you
put them down on a set they
immediately go away from the
light. Still, I think we got
some great shots." Concerned
about the safety of several
thousand four legged extras,
the filmmakers opted to mass-produce
a thousand artificial rodents,
including a multitude of vermin
mechanically articulated to
swim, most of which were come
to fiery end as the catacomb
erupts into a subterranean inferno.

The atmosphere
on the set was constantly light
thanks to the production's two
stars. One of the most serious
scenes in the film was the one
inside the zeppelin where Indy
and his father discuss for the
past trying to short things
out. The temperature was in
the hundreds and very uncomfortable,
particularly for Connery, wearing
a three-piece tweed suit, and
Ford, sporting his standard
leather jacket. Because the
actors were only being shot
from waist up Connery dropped
his trousers. At first, Ford
didn't like this but soon his
face dripping with perspiration,
he followed suit. They both
sat there for the remainder
of the serious father and son
dialogue minus their trousers.

Sean Connery, Ford
and Spielberg.

Connery is an
actor with the belief of having
fun at work and spreading that
enjoyment to others. "I
think the essence of the film
for me is the pleasure,"
was Connery's point of view.
"The greatest pleasure
is when the whole team is working
and then what you're all trying
to do works. When a film set
is harmonious and everybody
has the same similar intention
and goal, it's terrific. It's
like a microcosm of a really
good society. The nice thing
about Indiana Jones is the humor
and the fact that it's back
to an older age, not an age
of hardware and spacecraft,
but cars and airplanes and trains
and horses. I'm always looking
for the humor in a situation
and Harrison Ford has a nice
sly sense of humor and sneaks
up on you. I'm very impressed
by Steven Spielberg; he's very
inventive, very quick. We've
built up the humor as much as
possible in the relationship
between Indiana and his father."

"We like
to work fast and loose,"
explained Ford. "And we
like to have fun." "Working
with Sean was the pleasure that
it looks to be. He's a great
actor. I've learned from him."

"Sean was
great fun on the set,"
observed Doody, although she
had little screen time with
him. "He used to joke around
all the time. He came onto set
one day, this huge man, and
said [musically] 'Alison Doody,
Doody, Doody, Doody, do,' and
he's doing this little dance.
And I'm thinking, 'Oh, if I
only had a camera! He would
joke around. He would look at
me and say, [threateningly],
'I want to talk to you' - and
then he wouldn't say anything.
Frightened the life out of me.
He would joke around in the
middle of a scene or something
like that, and make light of
heavy moments."

Ford, also known
as jokester at the set of his
films, often joked around to
relieve the tension. Before
filming the love scene with
Doody he noticed Doody's embarrassment
and nervousness and tried to
make her laugh. In one of his
most efforts to do so he stood
behind Spielberg, puckering
up his lips and making silly
kissing noises and he simpered,
"Alison, I'm ready."

"Harrison
would joke with me all the time,"
said Doody. "What would
Harrison do? I can't think [especially],
but there was a moment where
I was tense or something, he
would joke around, which is
very nice because he would be
doing it to try and ease the
tension."

Ford made sure
that Doody was not only entertained
on the set. Many times they
would also talk scenes through
together, and Ford was always
willing to sort out any problems
the actress had. According to
Ford's biographer Robert Sellers,
when the british tabloids hounded
Doody for quotations about what
it was like to kiss Ford, she
turned to her co-star for guidance.
"Tell them," the actor
advised, "that Harrison
Ford is so famous he doesn't
even use his own tongue."

"Working
with Harrison was just such
a pleasure. He's a great man
to work with; he helped me a
great deal in many scenes",
acknowledged Doody. "He
could have left me and just
thought, 'Swim here,' but he
would talk scenes through. And
if I had a problem at, he was
always there and willing to
try and sort it out and my life
on set was made much easier.
So, working on those scenes
with Harrison, I was only worried
about my acting, because everything
else was fine."

Doody had a nice
word for her director too, "Steven
knew what he wanted, yet he
would let me explore and some
of the things that you wanted
to do. He was always open to
suggestions. If you thought,
'Well, do you think this works,
do it like this?' He would say,
'Yes that's great.' Or 'No,
I think it's better the other
way.' He really wasn't stuck
with one idea, which is really
nice. Direction-wise, he was
excellent; he would come to
you and say [whispering confidentially]
'How about doing this.' He gets
so enthusiastic about it."
And continued without hiding
her remorse, "The only
thing I'm sad over is that the
chances of me working with all
those people again are quite
slim. I enjoyed it thoroughly.
It's wonderful that they've
done so well, especially if
they're that nice."

The lightness
and good humor on set wasn't
enough to prevent some mishaps
from happening. During the filming
of the scene in which the Joneses
were tied up in a blazing room
within a Nazi stronghold, a
stunt backfired. While horrified
technicians struggled to free
them Ford and Connery were temporarily
exposed to the deadly flames.

Exploding ghost hull.

Right after escaping
death in the inflamed catacombs
Indy and Elsa are being pursued
in the streets of Venice. In
their efforts to get rid of
their pursuers the couple employs
a speedboat and the chase is
carried on water. The filming
of the scene was at the Tilbury
Docks in Essex, near
London and ultimately involved
two major stunts. In the first,
Elsa successfully pilots their
craft in between two large ships
that are being slowly pushed
together by a tugboat. One of
the pursuit boats following
them is crushed and explodes
violently toward camera. "Cuing
the two big ships was very difficult,"
Marshall recollected. "They
were really hard to move around,
and we had to cable them off
so they would be safe. When
the speedboats were going in
between the ships, they did
not actually get crushed, of
course, but we did have the
ships as close together as possible.
At one point, one of the speedboats
was actually rubbing the sides
of the two ships, and we had
to make sure that between the
time we rolled the camera and
the time the boats went through,
the ships did not drift in any
closer and squish the boats.
We had a floating platform in
between the two ships and we
used that to launch a ghost
hull, some dummies and the fire
and smoke. Before the shot started
you could actually see the platform
between the ships, but the instant
the explosion went off the platform
was obscured by smoke and the
blast. We put the main camera
on a floating platform about
a hundred yards out into the
harbor. We had to do the shot
twice because on the first take
the boat shell landed too short
of the camera. When we repeated
the stunt the next day everything
worked great -the ghost hull
exploded out so far that it
actually blew past the camera
a hundred feet away."

Preparing
and filming the speedboat/propeller
scene.

After the boat
explosion, Indy and Elsa are
still pursued by one remaining
speedboat. To make matters worse,
their own craft is crippled
by gunfire and begins to move
slowly toward the stern of a
large freighter whose spinning
propeller protrudes out of the
water. Indy jumps onto the enemy
boat and as he and the driver
engage in fisticuffs, the vessel
drifts closer to the propeller
until it is actually being chewed
up in the huge steel blades.
Filmed in a tank at Elstree,
the scene made use of specially
built speedboats constructed
with rear sections made out
of balsa wood and laced with
explosives to simulate the boat's
destruction by the ship's propeller.
Additional filming in England
was made at Stowe
School in Buckinghamshire,
which doubled as Indy's college.

Lucas and Spielberg.

On August 7, the
production moved to Venice for
establishing shots of the boat
chase in the vicinity of St.
Mark's Square and the
Doges
palace. Watts, "Having
shoot in Venice in August wasn't
that easy, because it was the
tourist season and it was extremely
crowded. There was no way I
could move it in the schedule,
so I had to specify to the local
people that, for the square
we needed to shoot in, I had
to have something we could control
in August. That obviously knocks
out certain places! All in all,
we had very good cooperation
and did manage to close of a
section of the Grand Canal for
a period. That was good, because
the film as set in 1938 so,
obviously, everything you see
in front of the camera has to
be pit in by us, so it's correct
for the period." Filming
in Venice was one of Alison
Doody's most intense memories.
"We did a lot of our own
jumping about and running around.
There was some stunt stuff that
was tricky. Running around in
high heels and Harrison Ford
pulling you along might not
seem to de [dangerous], but
I was at such speed that they
had three men standing there
so I could crash into them.
Because we were running around
up and down these steps and
things, and I was just running
so fast with Harrison and it's
very slippery - when we went
past camera, that would be it,
cut, we couldn't go any further.
So, I had three men standing
there so I could just go bowling
into them and they could literally
grab me. I was flying."

The
cast and crew on location
in Petra.

Later that week,
cast and crew flew to Jordan
and shot scenes in the ancient
city of Petra,
which served as the Holy Grail's
resting place. "Petra is
a gorge," explained Elliot
Scott, who first scouted the
location with Robert Watts.
"You reach it by going
through a narrow corridor in
a mountain of rock. This corridor
is about a mile long and just
wide enough to fit a small truck
- although most people go through
on horseback or on foot. When
you emerge, you enter a little
hidden valley, which is mountain-locked.
Petra was a perfect location
for us, in part because of its
rich sense of history. It was
famous around the time of Christ
for being the only way through
those mountains, and traders
bringing back silk from China
to Europe often traveled through
there. Back then, the people
of Petra charged a fee-and of
course became quite rich. The
valley is a mile long, and more
than thirty temples line the
canyon sides. The temple we
used was right opposite the
narrow opening. Many of these
temples or tombs go back to
about 600 B.C., but I think
the particular one we used was
built around the time of Christ.
Nobody knows for sure what it
was used for. Behind the temple
face are a few small, square
rooms, which are completely
empty. Whatever they held was
stolen long ago. It's quite
an incredible place - like a
tenth wonder of the world."

Queen
Noor visiting
the Petra set.

The production
crew filmed outside the remote
temple site for three days.
"The cooperation in Jordan
was fantastic," Spielberg
recalled. "Queen Noor,
who is American and the queen
to King Hussein, was with us
every day. As a matter of fact,
she drove me to the set every
day from the hotel with her
children in the back seat. We
would get to the set and shoot,
and she and the kids would stay
all day and watch. They had
a wonderful time. They opened
up their country to us and made
us feel very welcome, and I
am sure we'll go back there
to make another movie someday."

The first scene
to appear on film was actually
filmed last and it was the one
with River Phoenix as Young
Indy. In this scene young Indiana
Jones discovers a group of treasure-hunters
unearthing a 16th century cross.
The treasure-hunters are lead
by a man who wears a fedora
and leather jacket. Fedora,
as Boam named the character,
would inspire the adult Indy's
appearance and was played by
actor Richard Young. Realizing
its significance, Indy grabs
the cross and flees on his horse.
The thieves pursue him in cars
and Indy mounts a circus train
and he finds himself being chased
from boxcar roof to boxcar roof.
In his effort to avoid being
caught Indy comes across many
representatives of the animal
kingdom, some of which will
mark him for the rest of his
life.

Filming the horse
jump.

Originally, the
sequence was to have been shot
in the prehistoric cliff dwelling
ruins of Mesa
Verde National Park in
neighboring Colorado, but when
local Indian representatives
cited religious objections to
using the site in such a fashion,
the production agreed to look
elsewhere. Finally it was filmed
in Arches
National Park in Utah.
A tourist conveyance plying
a narrow gauge run between Antonita,
Colorado and Chama, New Mexico
served as a circus train for
young Indy's first escapade.
Working with the narrow gauge
locomotive proved to be an adventure
in itself. "You can't just
stop a train," noted Michael
Lantieri, supervisor of the
stateside mechanical effects
team. "If it misses its
mark, it takes blocks and blocks
to stop it and back up. We had
to take a lot of safety precautions
to make sure that people were
aware of when the train was
going to move or stop so that
no one would try to board or
step off at the wrong time.
Since actors and stunt people
were running on top of the cars
and jumping between them, we
made platforms to fit between
the cars. These rode down below
and served as a catch so that
if someone slipped, they would
not fall into the coupling and
wheels. Also because the tops
of the train cars were very
smooth, we had to hide handles
for people to grab onto during
scenes where they had to leap
from car to car." In addition
to rigging the train, Lantieri
and his crew were tasked with
preparing two vintage cars for
the sequence -a 1912 Model A
and a 1914 Saxon. Each of the
automobiles was retrofitted
with a Pinto V-6 engine. To
create a dustier desert environment,
the physical effects crew hung
sacks of dust under the cars
so they would spew out as the
vehicles drove along.

Spielberg
and River
Phoenix.

Though the New
Mexico location served well
for exterior shots of the circus
train interiors were filmed
on a soundstage at Universal
Studios in Los Angeles.
Lantieri rigged train cars that
featured wild sides and ceilings
constructed on makeshift gimbals
made from inner tubes that could
be inflated and deflated rapidly
to create a rocking motion.
The first train car Young Indy
stumbles into is filled with
snakes. He tries to get through
the car by traversing a catwalk
above; but when the catwalk
gives way, he falls into a pen
filled with slithering serpents,
a traumatic incident that establishes
and motivates his later fear
of snakes. "We had a few
thousand real snakes and also
some rubber ones for River to
fall on," Lantieri commented.
"There were five different
types of snakes, including one
huge boa constrictor that took
three people to carry in. The
snakes were in old wooden crates
piled on top of one another,
and some of the smaller snakes
started sneaking out of the
cracks once they arrived on
the set -which freaked out some
of the crew. At the end of the
day, we had to dig through the
sawdust on the floor to make
sure we had all the snakes back
in their crates so they could
be put away for the night."

Leaving the boxcar
with the snakes behind him Indy
comes face to face with two
irritable lions. "The lions
did fine," Lantieri recalled,
"although they were a little
nervous the first day. After
all, we were shaking the car
and dust was falling. We also
had lights rigged to flicker
through the cracks in the walls
of the car, so there was a lot
going on that the lions had
to get used to. Some of the
shots called for River to be
in the car with the lions; but
for any dangerous scenes, like
when a lion goes for his leg
and he uses his whip to pull
himself to safety, we used a
stunt double." The bullwhip
is established as Indy's weapon
of choice when he spots one
on the wall and uses it to keep
the fearsome cats at bay. In
his inexperience, however, he
cracks the whip and it snaps
him in the face, causing a gash
on his chin that corresponds
with Harrison Ford's familiar
scar.

Phoenix, Spielberg
and Richard Young.

Young Indy gets
pulled out of the lions' car
by Fedora and for one moment
stands to face his pursuer.
He quickly slips away, however,
and ducks inside 'Dr. Fantasy's
Magic Caboose' - a tongue-in-cheek
nod to co-executive producer
Frank Marshall who for years
has performed amateur magic
shows using that pseudonym.
Inside the caboose is a horde
of magic paraphernalia. With
Fedora on his heels, Indy steps
into a box on the floor and
closes the lid. Fedora enters
a moment later and opens the
box to find the youngster gone.
Unlike the other interior shots,
this disappearing trick was
filmed on the real train and
was suggested in part by production
designer Elliot Scott. "I
suggested to Steven that he
do it in one shot," Scott
remarked. "The idea was
to see the boy run in and climb
into the box. With the camera
still rolling, the man comes
in behind him, collapses the
box and realizes the boy has
disappeared. Then the camera
pans up and through the back
door and you see the boy running
away behind the train. We did
that by putting a trough under
the boxcar so the boy could
fall through, and then we had
another boy on the tracks further
back." With the shot of
the resourceful Indy running
off into the distance, the action-packed
opening of the film concludes.

Ford was present
for the duration of the Young
Indy filming scenes and helped
Phoenix understand the character
better. Phoenix from his side
found his days as Young Indy
very entertaining, "I love
the Indiana Jones films and
being part of one was a lot
of fun for me. It's all non-stop
action: running and jumping,
twisting and turning, fumbling,
finding, keeping from the bad
guys. It's only a small part
- only ten minutes at the movie's
beginning but I really enjoyed
it," said Phoenix. "It's
exciting to see how a dramatic
and dangerous situation unfolds
-- it's fun to witness it in
a movie theatre and it's fun
to make. I did a lot of the
stunts because I felt so much
of the character and what he
had to do was physical. It would
have been lying to have someone
else do the stunts. I would
just look at Harrison. He would
do stuff and I would not mimic
it but interpret it younger.
Mimicking is a terrible mistake
that many people do when they
play someone younger, or with
an age difference. Mimicking
doesn't interpret true, because
you can't just edit around."

Spielberg
and Slocombe.

The filmmakers
did their work the hard way
for the best results, filming
stunts primarily without the
blue screen process or traveling
mattes. "It was like putting
the clock back," Douglas
Slocombe observed during the
filming of the scene on the
top of a train, "but it
brings something extra to the
movie."

"Stunts are
an integral part of the Indiana
Jones movies," Frank Marshall
observes. "A great deal
of the action derives from the
stunts, so we take a lot of
time to storyboard and plan
them. The trick is to have them
look dangerous and incredibly
hard, but actually they're very
safe. They're quite simple to
do, they just require a lot
of hard work."

The last to go
before the cameras, the sequence
was also the one Spielberg most
enjoyed filming. "We shot
it after a three-week hiatus
and I was rested, which is part
of the reason I enjoyed it so
much. Also, I had Harrison there
every day. He pretty much directed
River, helping him with line
readings and gestures, and talking
with him about how Indy would
move. That freed me to worry
about sequencing the action,
which made my job a lot easier."

With some additional
shots in Colorado completed
Indiana Jones' crusade had come
to an end and everybody clinked
champagne glasses together and
toasted the end of the picture.

"What was
nice about doing this particular
film was that, because it was
all the same people, we were
able to avoid the feeling-out
process that was necessary on
Raiders,"
said Watts. "The first
day on the set was like one
big family getting back together.
Everybody involved was well
aware that there might not be
another Indiana Jones movie.
But I don't think that so much
created a different mindset
as it inspired us to think that,
if this were to be the last
one, let's make this a great
one to go out on."

The crew at airport
set.

On the close of
filming Last
Crusade Ford felt as
the loss of a friend. "I'll
miss the whole thing. There
is a lot of pleasure in this
character for me. I enjoy the
kind of humor that we have in
those films and I love doing
the physical stuff. It makes
me feel like a kid. I'll miss
the particular fun of playing
the character, but I think three
films is enough. I'll be in
my fifties pretending to be
thirty-five, and I'm afraid
it's going to get to a point
where it's too hard to get out
of the bed in the morning. I
just won't be able to do the
things I used to do," he
said. Spielberg from his side
said that he would miss Harrison's
funny look under the fedora,
"it feels like the end
of an era, and the end of a
quest."

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